In general, a molded body production device, which produces a molded body (green compact) by compression molding a powdered molding material, includes a molding die defining therein a cylindrical cavity with upper and lower openings and having upper and lower end surfaces defining the upper and lower openings, respectively, a lower punch having a lower punch surface which is to be inserted into the cavity from the lower opening of the molding die, and an upper punch having an upper punch surface which is to be inserted into the cavity from the upper opening of the molding die (for example, Patent Document 1).
According to such a molded body production device, for example, in a state that the upper punch is located above the upper end surface of the molding die and the lower punch surface is located into the cavity and below the upper end surface of the molding die, the molding material is supplied onto the lower punch surface within the cavity, and then the upper punch surface is moved down so that the molding material is compression molded using the lower and upper punch surfaces.
Conventionally, in such a molded body production device, for the purpose of preventing adhesion or bonding of the molding material to the lower and upper punch surfaces and the like, a release agent is applied onto each of the lower and upper punch surfaces before the molding material is supplied into the cavity described above.
As described in the Patent Document 1, conventionally, in a state that the upper punch is located above the upper end surface of the molding die and the lower punch surface is aligned with (is flush with) the upper end surface of the molding die, a nozzle is put between the upper punch and the lower punch. Thereafter, the release agent is applied onto each of the lower and upper punch surfaces by spraying the release agent upward and downward from the nozzle.
However, in the molded body production device according to the Patent Document 1, the release agent is applied only onto the lower and upper punch surfaces. Therefore, it is impossible to prevent the molding material from adhering or bonding to an inner circumferential surface defining the cavity of the molding die. This causes quality defects of an obtained molded body, to thereby raise a problem in that productivity thereof is lowered. Such a problem becomes more remarkable if used is a molding material having a high adhesive property, a molding material having a high shrinkage ratio when being compression molded, or the like.